BREWER, Maine — A local man called police Monday morning to report that an acquaintance had consumed the synthetic hallucinogenic drug bath salts and was trying to break into his Church Street apartment, Brewer police Capt. Jason Moffitt said Tuesday.

“The complainant said he could hear someone trying to get into his apartment,” Moffitt said. “The guy had been using monkey dust.”

Monkey dust is the street name in the Bangor region for the designer drug bath salts, which became illegal in Maine at the beginning of July.

Officers Rodney Gerald and Eduardo Benjamin and Cpl. Levi Sewall were dispatched to Church Street at around 11 a.m. Monday for a burglary in progress and found Shawn Botson, 26, a transient, in the stairwell of the multiunit apartment building, Moffitt said.

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“Shawn was in possession of a green box that contained pills, a pipe, marijuana in baggies,” he said.

Diverted prescription medications — Suboxone, lorazepam and atropine — were found on Botson, but no synthetic hallucinogenic drugs were, according to Moffitt. Botson was arrested and charged with two counts of possession of scheduled drugs, for the Suboxone and lorazepam, and trafficking in scheduled drugs for the atropine.

Botson also was charged with possession of a usable amount of marijuana and for violating his bail conditions. He was taken to the Penobscot County Jail and remained there on Tuesday, a jail official said.

Bath salts, a hallucinogenic drug, usually contains mephedrone or methylenedioxypyrovalerone, also known as MDPV.

The man who called police about the burglary later changed his mind about pursuing charges against his acquaintance, Moffitt said.

Botson was arrested in Old Town on Aug. 15 after he was found in possession of bath salts while parked along Kirkland Road at around 4:40 a.m. with a female, who was wanted for two outstanding warrants, police said. The pair had a container of bath salts, Old Town police Sgt. Scott Casey said at the time.

Botson and Sandra Manning, 24, both face charges of unlawful furnishing of synthetic hallucinogenic drugs associated with the August incident.